Staying healthy remains Filipinos’ top urgent personal concern–survey

Following a healthy diet could help reduce your risk of various health conditions. Image: yulkapopkova / IStock.com

MANILA, Philippines — Majority of Filipinos have said that their top personal concern remains to be staying healthy, especially as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to rage on.

A Pulse Asia survey, conducted on Sept. 6 to 11, found that 70% of adult Filipinos expressed concern about staying healthy and avoiding illness while 47% were concerned about having a secure and well-paying job.

Meanwhile, 46% expressed concern about having enough to eat everyday and 43% were concerned about completing one’s education or providing schooling for one’s children.

The Pulse Asia survey also found that Filipinos’ top urgent national concern that they want the Duterte administration to address is controlling inflation (41%), closely followed by increasing the pay of workers (40%).

They also want the Duterte administration to immediately address the COVID-19 pandemic (29%), poverty (29%), graft and corruption (26%), and employment (25%).

The Duterte administration enjoys majority approval ratings for its handling of nine issues, Pulse Asia said.

These are:

• fighting criminality (74%)
• responding to the needs of calamity-hit areas (71%)
• protecting the welfare of overseas Filipino workers (66%)
• promoting peace in the country (64%)
• providing assistance to those who lost their job or source of livelihood due to the pandemic (64%)
• enforcing the rule of law on all citizens (60%)
• controlling the spread of COVID-19 (59%)
• stopping environmental destruction (56%)
• fighting corruption (52%)

Meanwhile, the Pulse Asia survey found that Filipinos are most critical of the Duterte administration’s work in reducing poverty (32%) and controlling inflation (36%).

Despite the majority approval ratings on the issues, Pulse Asia found that the ratings “decline significantly” when compared to results of the June 2021 survey.

The disapproval scores also increased between June 2021 and September 2021 in the areas of increasing the pay of workers (+5 percentage points), controlling inflation (+6 percentage points), controlling the spread of COVID-19 (+8 percentage points), fighting graft and corruption (+10 percentage points), and reducing poverty (+10 percentage points), Pulse Asia found.

The survey used face-to-face interviews on 2,400 adults with a ± 2% error margin at the 95% confidence level.

JPV